


WorldEnder

by somethingofatrainwreck



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pirate, F/M, Lots of Cursing, Mild Sexual Content, Pirates, Slow Burn, Supernatural Elements, classic Bellarke
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-03
Updated: 2017-01-15
Packaged: 2018-09-14 09:36:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9173983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somethingofatrainwreck/pseuds/somethingofatrainwreck
Summary: If they have anything in common it's the way they both watch the clouds- because they know what happens on open waters, how quickly a storm can roll in. With just a small change in the wind, a sailor becomes a mutineer, a Princess becomes a Captain, pirates are heroes, ghosts exist, the sea can catch fire, and mostly they keep their mouths shut, because it's bad luck to talk about love on the deck of a ship that sails a black flag.Have you ever heard the one about the beautiful woman that lures the sailor to his death?





	1. Day 100

**Author's Note:**

> This is my biggest project of all my Bellarke projects. It's been sitting on my computer for almost two years! That being said- it was written during seasons one and two- I haven't kept up with the show so I don't really know who's dead or alive, who is sleeping with who, who is trying to kill who, etc, etc .
> 
> BUT.
> 
> This was the part of the show I was in love with- the Bellarke I fell in love with. 
> 
> There will be cursing and other pirate-like activities (nothing too Black Sail-ish though)
> 
> As always, thanks for reading!

**DAY 100**

 

When the rain finally stopped, little girls with blonde ponytails sang as they ran through the alley behind the tavern. The bottoms of their dresses drug in the mud and the petals from their flower crowns flowed down into their hair like colorful drops of water. They were enviable. The baker’s wife shot them glares as she tossed buckets of water from inside of her front door. The fisherman shouted obscenities as they headed to drink away another penniless day. Even the other children, who were still shivering from nights spent in cold, wet houses, stuck out their foot as if to trip the girls.   
   
Clarke Griffin watched, sitting with her hands tucked into her pockets counting the same three silver coins over and over again. One, two, three. One, two, three. Father, Mother, Wells.   
   
Sometimes she remembered who she used to be, it was like finding old dried-up flower petals in the tangles of her admittedly filthy hair. “That used to be you,” she’d think, "stupid and small and happy.” She wasn’t that person anymore, no longer a little Princess with mud stains on the bottom of her dress. She wore thick belts of leather and poorly sewn britches, accessorized by a litany of weapons and blood stained fingers. Now, as she watched those girls that used to be her, she thinks about what they would do if a two-headed snake crossed their path. See it’s extra head as an extra threat and run in absolute terror? Or see it as the awkward and deformed monstrosity that it is, point their chubby fingers and laugh?   
   
What would a child do if it came across a two-headed snake, and what will a sailor do if he comes across a pirate ship with two captains?   
   
“Clarke!” a gangly young man came running out of the tavern, tripping over his own boots. The people on the street watched him, especially as he nearly knocked over the little girls with the ponytails. Clarke held up a hand to him as he approached, with wide eyes he skidded to a stop in front of her.   
   
“Jordan, look around you,” she warned, “what have we talked about?”   
   
His eyes grew impossibly wider as he glanced around and met the gaze of well over a dozen people. “Captain Griffin,” he corrected in a loud voice that bordered on theatrical, “Captain Griffin if I may- um we require your uh- assistance in the tavern- sir- ma’m, ma’m- miss- your majesty.”   
   
“Are you drunk Jordan?” She asked as she jumped down from the crate she’d been sitting on. The question was basically rhetorical, she could smell the rum on him even as he started taking careful steps away from her.   
   
“I know, I know I’m supposed to be working but Captain you’re needed in the tavern, right away. It’s Bellam- Captain Blake.”   
   
Just as he stuttered through Blake’s proper title there was a crash from inside the dimly lit tavern, followed by an awful lot of laughter.   
   
Awkward and deformed monstrosity it is then.   
   
The air in that tavern was exceptionally humid, thick with the steam of drying clothes and body odor. The stench that comes off of sailors after a bad storm (or battle) is something Clarke would never grow used too. It was one of the reasons that she had fled to the alleyway – that and she’d started growing pale from a lack of sun. Now it’s golden light seeped into the bar room in long bright lines- almost as if it was shining through the cracks in the walls more than the windows.   
   
She saw their people clumped around the rickety tables, mugs in hand. Except for Raven, Raven stood in the middle of the floor with her long arms extended in both directions. She was limping on her leg still, so Clarke watched as she bobbed back and forth-  a ragged piece of a once regal naval vessel just trying to stay afloat in a fucking hurricane.   
   
A hurricane named Bellamy.   
   
“We don’t know how much powder we have, don’t waste our ammunition on this shit-“ Raven sneered, glaring at Bellamy as the large bearded man that stood behind her let out a laugh.   
   
“Nah, let him come out to play Miss," the man said, “it’s easier to run the young ones through, a nice clean cut, not nearly as much fat.” The man unsheathed a sword and held it up to shine in the dusty beams of sunlight.   
   
Bellamy, whose hair was still half wet and matted to his forehead, pulled the pistol from its habitual resting place in the waistband of his pants. He didn’t load it, didn’t aim it, just weighed it in his hand- smirking as the bearded man continued his taunting laughter.   
   
Jasper had come to get her with hopes that she would interfere, because that’s how things had worked on their vessel thus far. Bellamy overreacted, Clarke calmed him down. Clarke overlooked something, Bellamy picked up the slack. Two Captains, leading a ship of delinquent adolescents who had no experience on the sea. The idea was that they’d be two halves of a whole, one part to balance out the other. At times she thought maybe they’d finally achieved that balance- and then the moment would pass and she’d be left feeling like an extra head flopping around, trying to make itself look as intimidating as its counterpart.   
   
She and Bellamy were a mutation- a dysfunctional abnormality. The King hadn’t managed to kill them. The pirates hadn’t managed to kill them. The sea hadn’t managed to kill them.  But in the end they were two very young people with two very different agendas. Bellamy preferred violence. Clarke was a healer. Though she suspected he wasn’t nearly as blood thirsty as he’d like everyone to believe, and she knew that sometimes her instinct wasn’t to heal.  
   
But the trust was there- another abnormality. Why should she trust a fucking pirate with her life? Because she’d made a choice. She’d chosen to take up his cause. She was a pirate just as much as him.   
   
“Captain Blake,” she said- nodding in acknowledgement of the relief on Raven’s face when she spotted her. “Suns out, storms gone, time to go.” He looked away from the man long enough to glare at her- a flashback to their many, many arguments. “ _I_ think it’s time to go," she clarified, "I look forward to your assessment of conditions on the way to the docks.”   
   
“Blake huh?” the old man interrupted. “You’ll be the mutineer then- and his high born whore-“ 

 

Clarke had been called worse-  by her co-captain himself on occasion. As far as she was concerned the man's words had simply come and gone in a gust of stale breath- but Bellamy didn't just let things come and go. The old man seemed to already know that about him, about his protectiveness - the way he interpreted an insult to her as an insult to himself. The gun tipped up, just slightly. Bellamy tried to keep the smirk on his face. He wouldn't be afraid of shedding blood here. He wanted them to make a name for themselves. He believed if they weren’t feared they'd be vulnerable.   
   
“Start supervising repairs,” Bellamy said, “I’m not finished here.”   
   
There was movement around them as some of their younger sailors scattered like rats. The fight was going to come, she felt it in the air. The only thing left at that point was deciding how much damage would be done.

 “I’ll be needing the pistol,” she said with the regal decorum she remembered her mother struggling through during those many meetings with Marcus Kane and his men after her father's execution. _"When you feel desperate- don't show it,"_ she had always said, _" a woman performs the same actions as a man praised for bravery and she’s branded as hysterical."_ With a small breath, Clarke suppressed the waves of nausea that usually accompanied a memory of her mother and stepped closer to try and gain Bellamy's full attention. “Reyes is right. We need to take stock of our ammunition.”   
   
“I’m not going to waste the shot," he mumbled, his eyes never leaving the bearded man. Clarke glanced around at the people gathered around him- Miller and Murphy and Sterling and Monroe, all four of whom seemed just as furious. It was the most united they had ever looked. She had obviously missed the start of this standoff, and though it wasn't overtly important- she did wonder what the man could have possibly said to cause such unified fury. There were only a few things in this world Bellamy cared enough about to pull his gun.   
   
“Where’s Octavia, Bellamy?” she asked, having decided to try distraction instead – hoping his brotherly instincts will diffuse the tension.   
   
He didn't even flinch. “Apothecary, less than an hour ago. Took Monty with her. She’ll be fine.”   
   
“It’s a strange town," she reminded him. The last time they had made port, a very brief stop in a small port town just before the attack, Octavia had disappeared for two hours. An enraged Bellamy had threatened just about every person that crossed his path- until Raven had found her, petting a horse in the stables.    
   
“She’s going straight back to the ship,” Bellamy said.  
   
“What if she doesn’t? What if she wanders off again?”   
   
He didn’t look away, but Clarke could see the signs of him struggling with himself. “I trust her,” he mumbled unconvincingly.   
   
“Look for her," Clarke goaded, "go make sure she’s alright.”   
   
Maybe it would have worked, the way she had intricately extracted the anger from his mind like a ship from a bottle, but then the man let out a laugh and drained his stein. An even angrier Bellamy cocked the pistol.   
   
“You’re drunk,” Clarke reminded him. She could see it in the slump of his shoulders, sober confidence soaked in rum shrinks into misguided arrogance.   
   
“Still a good shot," he said.  
   
She lowered her voice- speaking like they were in private. He was always more reasonable when it was just the two of them. “A waste.”   
   
“No.”   
   
“Bellamy.”   
   
The old man belched. “The wife has a point son, put that thing away before you hurt yourself.”   
   
Bellamy laughed, “You have no idea who’s pointing a gun at you right now.” 

He couldn't have known. Clarke barely knew. Bellamy was a soldier, a sailor, a mutineer, and a Captain. He was a good shot, and an even better swordsman. He was intense and determined and at his worst blindingly fucking selfish. He was a dangerous man in every way a man could be dangerous.  She would still be weary of him- if depending on him hadn’t come so easy.   
   
“You won’t scare me boy,” the old man said, “We know all about you- folks are calling your ship the Ark, filled with all the animals the King couldn’t kill.”   
   
At the word "boy" Bellamy's finger tensed on the trigger. Clarke tried to step between them, but Raven stuck an arm out to keep her in place.   
   
“What we did was mercy,” Clarke said, and for the first time she really believed it. “That’s one more corrupt naval ship out of commission. One less ship to take your family away to some mysterious island when they can’t manage to pay their taxes. Open your eyes. Kings aren’t in control anymore.”   
   
The men didn't look afraid. They mocked her with raised eyebrows. It was likely that they didn't care who was or wasn't in charge. They were pirates. They didn't have families- they certainly didn't pay taxes. “Then who is?” the man asked.  
   
Neither Clarke nor Bellamy said anything, but both of their eyes glanced upward as if they were still sailing in the shadow of it.   
   
“The Mountain?" he laughed. "No one believes that shit. Nothing but a sailor’s story.”   
   
“But you’re warning me about immortal pirate queens?” Bellamy scoffed. Clarke turned her head to stare at him, she knew exactly what stories he was talking about. The ones Lincoln had told them through gasps of air and heaves of sea water- unsinkable ships with undefeated Captains. Women who had sold their souls to the sea. Even in the shadow of the Mountain Cage's navy had seemed terrified of that ship when it sailed through the storm clouds with it's torn sails of grey. Had it not appeared and drawn their fire, it's likely that Clarke would be at the bottom of the ocean. Her issue with these stories of unsinkable ships and immortal Captains is that that ship with grey sails had sunk- on her orders- and the only survivor of that attack was sitting in the brig of their ship.   
   
“If only they were just a story,” the man said. He brazenly looked Clarke up and down, “ and they’ll be coming for you love. A beautiful woman in sea-salted leather – Aye that’s just what they look for. And then you’ll drag this one right down with you.” He turned to his men and gestured to Bellamy, “Not a man on earth could give up a highborn whore even if it meant dying.”   
   
In one quick movement the gun was tossed onto the table and slid in Clarke’s direction while Bellamy’s fist made contact with the man’s whiskered face. 

 Bellamy was a thin man, but his arms were corded with thick muscle. Clarke had seen him easily do the work of three when he had the motivation. She watched those muscles flex under the dark blue of Bellamy's shirt- tidal waves colliding with the jaw of the bearded man- whose friends had started to crowd together as if to intervene. But that wasn’t the way of it there- there was no interfering. You fought for what you wanted, fought for whatever you thought was right. Clarke had learned a long time ago not to drag Bellamy away from trouble- let him face it, let him defeat it, let him move on.   
   
An overturned table and a shout from the Bar Keep later and the bearded man finally pushed Bellamy away and raised his hands. There was sweat and blood, but Bellamy’s eyes were shining with victory. He stood to catch his breath and grinned- some of the weight lifted of his shoulders. His steps were lighter as he grabbed up his effects and gestured for their crew to head out. Clarke waited until he was at her side to assess him, slightly swollen cheek, bruise along the jawline, all dulled by his glowing ego.   
   
“Back to the ship within the hour,” he called to the room, “we’ve got work to do.”   
   
The bearded man had grabbed up the bottle of rum Bellamy had been nursing. He held it up to them as they navigated around the crowd to the door. “Good on you boy, for defeating an old drunken man, but you’ve no idea what kind of storm you’re sailing into.” He grinned, his yellowed teeth stained even more by blood. “You’ll never leave the channel alive.” 

But Bellamy didn't look back. He had already moved on.

 

**...**

 

   
Their ship had never looked worse.   
   
She sailed nameless, because The Phoenix had been a slave ship, and that wasn't who they were. People had been calling it The ARK, and as Bellamy looked around at his crew- splashing in rain puddles and laughing through their chores- he understood why. These weren’t sailors, they certainly weren’t pirates. He was captaining a ship of orphans. Kids whose home had been wiped out by something worse than a flood. He hadn’t built this ship with his own two hands, hadn’t heard the voice of God in his ear, but he had bled for it. He had risked everything for it. He had taken it- and with it the poor souls it was transporting- who looked to him now like some kind of beacon.   
   
Had it not been for the pile of chiffon and lace he’d tossed in the brig after the mutiny – he probably would have collapsed under the pressure.  
   
“We’ll barely have enough for the repairs.” Clarke said- the chiffon and lace is gone now, replaced by form-fitting leather and dirt. She stood at his side with her hand shielding her eyes from the sun.   
   
Bellamy wiped the sweat from his forehead and blew some blood from his nose. “Make do,” he mumbled, “we always do.”   
   
She gave him a sideways glance, a nurse's glance, “Anything broken?”   
   
He hated when she looked at him like that, because it meant that they had truly crossed into the territory where she didn't find him intimidating at all. “No.”   
   
“Hands?”   
   
“Fine.”   
   
She would have reached for them had they been alone. He was glad on the crowded dock she stuck to rolling her eyes. “Why are you drunk when we’re meant to ship out this afternoon?”   
   
Because of the storm. Because they'd watched that ship sink. Because of Lincoln, Because of his sister, Because he’d just sailed through a mess of misery and death and like a man drowning he had no idea which way was up and which was down. “

Thirsty," he said. 

She knew anyway. She knew because it’s never just him or her but _them_. It happened to them. It’s up to them to fix it. 

He watched the younger kids make a game out of rolling barrels into the hold. Collins was supposed to be supervising them, but when Bellamy finally found him with his eyes, the idiot was too busy smiling at Clarke to notice much of anything. Smiling at her- looking suspiciously at him- at some point Finn Collins had become the most dangerous person on the vessel- Bellamy just hoped he was the only one that noticed.   
   
“How long are we going to pretend like they aren’t real?” Clarke asked, once he'd accepted a scrap of fabric from her to apply to his nose.   
   
“They aren’t real," he said. He had been saying the same thing for days. As someone who had spent a lot of time telling bedtime stories to a sleepless little girl- he could recognize a cautionary tale when he heard one. He tried not to be irritated with her for bringing it up again. She didn't actually believe it either- for some reason she just needed him to confirm his own disbelief every few hours or so.   
   
“We saw them.”   
   
“We don’t know what we saw.”  
   
A ghostly ship sailing through fog. Afloat- even through cannon fire. Bright blue eyes framed in black coal. The silence, all the sea birds out of sight, the clouds standing still in the sky, the waves lying flat, the wind stilled.   
   
“It could have taken us,” she said- for what must be the seventh time- “it should have.”   
   
“Well it didn’t," he balled up the scrap of fabric and jammed it into his pocket. "Maybe it wasn’t even there. Maybe it was the fog.”   
   
She sighed. “Maybe it was the mountain.”   
   
He thought about laughing- just a humorless chuckle at their own expense, because never in his wildest dreams would he have imagined sailing in black waters and being more afraid of ghosts than pirate guns. “What would be worse?" he asked- almost genuinely, "a pirate army of sirens or Cages’s navy?”   
   
“What if they were coming for Lincoln?” she asked, “ He said- that day he said he was running from something-“   
   
Bellamy shook his head- everything that had come out of Lincoln's mouth that day had either been a lie or bedtime story. His ranting had sounded almost like the lyrics to a sailor's drinking song. “He was delusional. He nearly drowned.”   
   
“We still don’t know where he came from," she said, "if he had been on that ship- what would a sea goddess want with a fisherman?"  
   
He nodded. “That's why we’re leaving him here.”   
   
“No," Clarke said. "Octavia isn’t going to allow that.”   
   
“Octavia doesn’t make the decisions.”   
   
She looked a little shocked by how angry he sounded. It wasn't anger really, it was frustration. He could never actually be angry with Octavia- but he was considering locking her in the brig until they found somewhere safe.  

“He may prove useful," Clarke said- though she sounded doubtful. "He may know the Sleeping Isles.”   
   
That was another nonsensical sailor's song that Bellamy was sure didn't actually exist.  
   
“Or he may be leading us into a trap. Are you willing to risk it?”   
   
“The only thing that matters it that The Mountain is real. We know that now- we know what they are, what that place is." The wind blew her hair into her eyes- so she took a step closer to his side to shield herself. "They won’t stop hunting us. We either find another vessel or we get where they can’t follow. We can navigate the channel- especially with a native. Cage wont follow – it wont be worth it for him to sail into pirate infested waters, especially if he believes in the Sirens.”   
   
He tried not to focus on the Sirens, or Cage, only on the one thing they had- in their favor or against it: Lincoln. “We don’t even know that he’s a native-“   
   
“Octavia has been speaking to him-“   
   
He held a hand up- because using his sister as a go-between wasn't okay and she knew it. “He’s going to say whatever it takes to keep himself alive.”   
   
She looked around and lifted herself on her toes to speak into his ear. “He says he’s from a place called Washington’s Rock," she said, "It was on one of my Father’s maps.” 

That changed things, because though he was dead- Jake Griffin had been guiding this voyage from the start.   
   
“You’re sure?” he asked.   
   
“Positive." She eased back down to her normal height. He watched her fiddle with the pocket watch that never left her pocket. "Those maps were my dreams.” 

He stared at her as she looked out onto the horizon- like maybe she could still see the lines and coordinates on those maps. He had put a lot of faith in her already- a stupid amount of faith- more faith than he'd ever put in another person and mostly that was because of the way she looked at the horizon. She wasn't afraid of it- not like he was. She was grounded- always- even out at sea. He trusted her judgement- her instincts, sometimes more than his own.   
   
“He stays in the brig –" he conceded, because still the only thing he was willing to discuss was Lincoln, "and when he’s on deck he's restrained.”   
   
“We rescued him-“  
   
“And there’s been a ship with grey sails following us ever since," he snapped- so viciously that he smelt the rum on his own breath and shook his head.  
   
“You need to sober up," she said.  
   
“I am sober.” 

She didn't believe him, but she smiled a little anyway.   
   
“At least wipe the blood from your knuckles.” 

They're experts at that now- wiping away the blood.

"We need to be at sea by sunset.," he tells her. She's already walking away- leaving him and his stained knuckles to stare off nervously at the horizon, looking for spots of grey in the clouds.


	2. DAY ONE

**DAY ONE**

 

She'd been summoned like a dog.

From the cramped make-shift hospital where she'd been dueling death for hours, a man had guided her through the bowels of the ship with a hand on the small of her back, promising her that it would be best to just get it over with.

The Captain wanted to see her. The Captain who had thrown her into the brig to lay in a pool of her own blood. The Captain who certainly hadn't earned his title, but had taken it, and in that battle had caused the deaths of at least 17 people. A fucking mutineer had ordered her to abandon the injured, and she was far too tired to fight it. 

The Captain’s quarters were ill lit- the large chandelier that once bathed the room in gold laid in pieces on a royal blue rug. A pile of broken furniture took up space in the corner, stacked tall with shattered chairs, chunks of porcelain, and torn books. The essentials remained, a bed, the massive table bolted to the floorboards, and the stacks of maps and star charts that covered it. As the Captain's man closed the door behind her, Clarke Griffin stared straight through the mess into the night sky. She could barely make out the moon through the dusty windows.   
   
“Fucking hell, have you actually bathed in shit?” she jerked her eyes from the hazy stars and looked over her shoulder. A man was leaning against the wall, two muskets at his side. His face was pinched as if in physical pain, but he had no visible injuries, in fact it looked as though he’d taken a jacket from one of the officers and ripped the insignias from the fabric to claim it as his own. He had the face of a thief, sharp angles and narrowed eyes. She had no idea if he was the great Captain Blake everyone had been talking about- she hoped not.   
   
“My sincerest apologies for assaulting your senses with the blood of your fallen comrades,” she said, dipping into a mock curtsy with what was left of her dress.  
   
“That’s a way to keep the dogs off you huh,” the man said with a sneer as he approached her “proper little princess covers herself in shit and maybe none of us will remember what’s hiding under that diamond studded dress of hers.” He reached out his hand like he was going to touch her sleeve, and she remembered that the scaphoid is located in the thumb side of the wrist- it breaks under the least amount of pressure.   
   
“That’s enough Murphy,” the man behind her said- all semblance of his friendly smile had disappeared.   
   
“Already called her for yourself Collins?” Murphy laughed, “What a shame- nothing a bucket of seawater couldn’t fix.”   
   
Collins removed a sword from his belt and held it in Murphy’s direction, “I said enough.”   
   
Murphy turned from Clarke and raised his eyebrows at the sword, “Funny thing is mate, I’m a free man today. And that means that’ll I’ll do whatever I want- I don’t listen to no one’s orders but my own.”   
   
“Come again?” A harsh voice filled the room as the door opened and closed.  Clarke didn’t turn around, but she ccould see a vague shadow of a man in the window- tall, with a military stance and a visible lack of patience.   
   
“Baring yours Captain- of course,” Murphy stuttered pathetically. Clarke would have laughed if she hadn’t been so unbelievably uncomfortable.   
   
“Put the sword down before you hurt yourself Collins.”   
   
The man brushed past her, staring down at charts in his hand until he reached the ordinate chair on the opposite side of the table. Even with his head bowed- she could see the arrogance on him. His cheek bones were chiseled in a permanent smirk. His hair was messy and black- drying it looked. He’d probably washed since the day’s battle. 

There was nothing about him that would indicate that he was a Captain, no elaborate jacket or large feathered hat. He wore the simple uniform britches of a sailor and a dark linen shirt that he probably stole from the former captain’s wardrobe. Other than the hilt of the sword at his side- decorated with the crest of the King, the only indication of his authority was the look in his eyes. When they finally met hers- a foreboding brown- her shoulders stiffened. He looked like chaos – chaos neatly masked by a hero's face. Deceiving, conniving, selfish. A handsome charlatan that would be the death of them all.   
   
“Well,” he said- taking in the blood and filth on her clothes and smirking, “this is humbling.”   
   
She swallowed her words, trying to summon her instincts to be a diplomat. “Captain Bellamy Blake,” he said, “but you know that.”   
   
 "Is there something I can do for you?” she asked, though hard as she tried she couldn’t force her voice to sound pleasant. “I was told that you _summoned_ me.”   
   
He leaned back in his chair and continued to assess her, “It’s Griffin?” he asked. She saw a small flash of something that may have been respect in his eyes when the name passed his lips, but it immediately faded back into the arrogance that made it almost painful to meet his eyes.   
   
“Yes,” she said.   
   
He nodded, “Alright Princess,” he said, “can you be trusted or will you need to sleep in the brig tonight?”   
   
Clarke didn’t waver- not even for a second, “I’m confused as to why I was tossed in the brig in the first place.”   
   
“You were incapacitated,” he explained, “seemed safer.”   
   
“Am I that dangerous?” she snapped, “of the two of us- you’re the one that incited a riot responsible for deaths of 17 people.”   
   
One of the men behind her inhaled sharply, and Clarke watched the mask on Bellamy Blake’s face slip again. It was quiet, for what she thought was about 17 seconds, one for every name she doubted he even knew, and then he opened his mouth and dismissed her with his hand, “Brig it is.”   
   
“I belong in the hospital," she said, before Murphy could step forward and drag her away like a dog. “I’m useful there, I can save lives- I have saved lives.”   
   
“It’s true,” Collins chimed in, “Octavia will speak for her if you need-“   
   
“I know,” Bellamy said harshly, “I know what she’s done.”   
   
“So this is you trying to talk your way out of thanking me?” Clarke asked. His eyes snapped up to meet hers, he was actually starting to look confused, concerned for his own ability to intimidate people.   
   
“Thank you?”   
   
“Thank me, because the moment you took this ship, you became responsible for everyone aboard. That pile of bodies out there is a little smaller thanks to me. That’s less blood on your hands. Unless you’ve decided in your new role as a Pirate Captain that you’re unconcerned with the spilling of innocent blood.”   
   
His jaw twitched, his knuckles almost cracking with the force he was using to the clench them. He leaned forward so he could look over her shoulder and tilted his head towards the door.   
   
“Out," he said to the men behind her.   
   
Murphy left the room with a chuckle, Collins hesitated by the door. “That was an order Collins.” 

Clarke looked back, the man was obviously torn, so she nodded at him- she was reasonably sure that she wasn’t in any danger. The truth was that under all of that anger, Clarke was pretty sure she had impressed Captain Blake. With one last look, Collins left- slamming the door behind him.   
   
She turned her head and locked eyes with the Captain, letting every bit of frustration she’d felt all day show on her face. “I lost a good friend today," she finally said. “I blame you.”   
   
“You blame me?” he repeated with a skeptical raise of his brow, “Was it me that sentenced you and your friend to banishment and pinned you in the cargo hold of a ship like cattle?”   
   
“You started a war on this vessel,” she said, “and he was a casualty of that war.”   
   
Bellamy narrowed his eyes and adjusted himself in his chair, “Where exactly do you think this ship was headed Princess? Some remote little island where you could live out your banishment in peace? A mysterious colony that doesn’t exist on any map?”   
   
She was silent, choosing to stare at her own reflection in the windows behind him.   
   
“There are a lot of things being done in the dark Griffin, by your King- the man who strung up your own father-“   
   
“Don’t,” she snapped. “He’s not my King.”   
   
“He has secrets,” Bellamy continued, “horrible secrets- bartering human lives for land.”   
   
She wrinkled her nose- trying to discern exactly what he was suggesting, “Slave trade?” she said, “you think he was-“ she almost wished she had something to sit on now.   
   
“This vessel was bound for an island on the edge of Dontae’s kingdom,” he explained, almost patiently.  “They say it’s just a tiny village at the base of a volcano- Mt. Weather, run by Dontae’s youngest son. It’s a black market- borders the trade routes and hostile waters. But it’s chief feature is human trafficking.”   
   
She thought about her father- the rage in his eyes. How he’d seemed absolutely broken after his promotion. “How do you – how did you come by this information?” she asked.   
   
“Doesn’t matter- you know it’s the truth,” he said, staring at her with such intensity that she almost wants to take a step back, “most likely its the same secret that killed your father.”   
   
She stared down at her feet. Wells’ final words echoing back to her again, _You should be angry._  
   
“My sister was on this ship,” he said, “she and 99 other people who had no idea what was happening to them. No one deserves a life of slavery and I would die before I let that happen to her. 17 people lost their lives today, but every one that survived escaped a life of torture and cruelty because of me. I risked everything for these people,” his eyes flashed, “don’t ever fucking accuse me of not being concerned with the spilling of innocent blood.”   
   
She tucked a piece of hair behind her ear and met his eyes.   
   
“So I’ll ask again, can I trust you or do you need to spend the night in the brig?”   
   
“And my answer is the same. I belong in the hospital.”   
   
He nodded and looked back down at his charts as if she was dismissed. Instead of leaving she took a step towards him, almost touching his pristine table with her filthy hands. “I know you fancy yourself the hero,” she said, “and I’d never begrudge you for trying to save someone you love from a terrible fate, but when you took this ship over, when you decided to be its Captain, this became about much more than your sister. This isn’t a game. It’s not a chance for you to order your men around and play dress up. You’ve created a floating box of anarchy- they’re young, and furious, and hostile. They’ve been locked up for months and not only have you handed them the key, but you’ve passed out weapons. This doesn’t end here. They’ll come after this ship- these people will need to be protected.”   
   
He stood up, “I am more than fucking aware of what needs to be done.”   
   
“Are you?” she repeated, “you may have been a sailor but that doesn’t make you a Captain- I know what a real Captain looks like-“   
   
“Daddy told you bedtime stories so you think you can rule the seas Princess?”   
   
“I’ve been learning navigation since I learned to read. I spent my childhood on ships, if I’d been born with a cock I’d have been next in line to be Admiral.”   
   
Bellamy snorted, “And you would have suffered the same fate as your father. You can look at me like I’m the filthiest piece of scum on the earth Princess, but we’re on the same side. This is my ship- if you don’t like it feel free to jump.”   
   
“You’re afraid,” she said, “this is too much. You think you have control of the situation but you don’t. This is a goddamn disaster waiting to happen and you know it. You want this to be your ship, you want them to follow you, but you’re afraid. I can see it, and if I can see it- they will too.”   
   
Suddenly there was a knock at the door- two girls stumbled in, clearly drunk, giggling all over each other. They mumbled an apology for being late and batted their eyelashes at him. They looked right through Clarke, but Bellamy didn’t. Despite their entrance he didn’t take his eyes off of her- furious and challenging but something that also almost looked relieved.   
   
“Well,” she said, “I’m pleased to see you have your priorities in order.” She turned her back to him and walked a wide circle around the girls to get to the open door. “Best of luck to you Captain Blake.”   
   
Outside the moon was surprisingly bright, it almost seemed the light was coming from the sea itself. It was funny the way that worked- that nature could be so beautiful on a day filled with so much death. Clarke took a moment to look up at the stars- those same comforting stars that she'd been mapping since she was a child. Sometimes looking at them felt like looking into her father's eyes again.

Someone cleared their throat and she nearly jumped out of her skin. Mr. Collins was leaning against the rail, clearly waiting for her even though he was pretending to be admiring the night sky.   
   
“That’ll be all Mr. Collins,” she said, “ I can escort myself back to the hospital.”   
   
He watched her walk past him before sticking an arm out to block her path. “He needs help," he said, and though she heard some animosity in his “he” it was obvious that he still held some level of respect for their wayward Captain. “They’re afraid of him but they don’t have faith in him."

Clarke remembered enough from her history lectures to know that fear could only compel people to obey and follow for a short time. Eventually someone would realize they were being treated unjustly- and they would take up the cause. He or she would be the mutineer to Blake’s King, a vicious circle that would repeat over and over- snuffing out young lives with every rotation.  
   
But that wasn’t her problem. They would have to make port eventually – especially at the rate the rations were going. She’d jump ship there- take whoever wanted to live with her.  
   
“He brought this on himself,” she said dismissively.  
   
For a brief second it seemed like Collins would actually let her walk away. Until he turned to face her, his eyes glazed over with exhaustion- the guilty conscience of a mutineer who follows the orders of an imposter. “What he’s been saying- about the slave trade, do you believe that’s true?”   
   
She didn’t want to, but something inside her was screaming that it was. Something had aligned in her mind the moment Blake had spoken those words aloud. She’d suspected something- hearing it put into words had only confirmed it. Blake was obviously a complete scoundrel, but she trusted his suspicions about the Mountain, whether it was slave trade or something equally as nefarious, the fact of the matter was that the King had tossed these prisoners out to sea knowing full well they’d live a life of misery. A punishment not at all weighted to fit their crimes- for the most part at least. Possibly he’d even done it to settle his own debts. No one really knew what was going on in the highest towers of the castle anymore, and those who did couldn’t breathe a word of it. “My father died because he knew something,” she said, “I was sent on the voyage out of spite- so was Wells.” 

“But you don’t know for sure-“

“Mr. Collins-“

“Finn,” he said.

She nodded once, “Finn, I realize that Bellamy Blake is not an ideal Captain- possibly not even someone you feel you could ever look up too, I completely understand that feeling,” she said, “but of all the nonsense that’s come out of his mouth, of all the secret self-serving motivations he probably has, I truly believe that he had information that indicated this ship was headed towards something terrible. I believe that he wanted to save his sister. I can guarantee you he doesn’t give a damn about anyone else- but he did want to save her. You shouldn’t lose any sleep over the events of today. You saved yourself- any other causalities are on him.”

He stared at her- a small smirk tipping the left side of his mouth. “Thanks Princess,” he said.

“Clarke,” she insisted.

“Clarke.”

They locked eyes for a moment, until she actually felt herself start to blush. “Goodnight Mr. Coll- Finn.”  
   
“They’d follow you,” Finn called out as she turned away, “with your last name- after what you did in the hospital today.”   
   
She shook her head. The inevitable mutiny upon a mutiny would never work with a woman taking lead, and even if it did, she wouldn’t be stupid enough to try. Given time his reign may weaken, but right now the people were grateful……and he had control of all the guns.  
   
“I really should get back,” she looked back at the Captain's door where unseemly sounds were starting to seep through, “when he’s had his fill for the night you should see about having your friend Raven freed from the brig. Send her to hospital- or better yet have her get started on ship repairs, remind him that she was raised by the family that built this ship.“   
   
“I know.” He said, though he seemed suspicious of how she knew all of that. Like minded women have a tendency to bond when they’re being held captive in the same cage, especially when one of them is dressed in full Naval Uniform. Clarke had always been told women didn’t belong in the Navy, that the uniform was sacred. Raven Reyes didn’t seem to give a shit about any of that. 

“I will,” Finn promised.

There was one thing she wasn’t clear on- even having overheard Raven and Finn arguing as she’d come too in the brig.  
   
“You two- are you-“ she asked.  
   
“I don’t know,” he said, “we were once but- when I was arrested.”   
   
“Everything changed?”   
   
“Yeah.” 

She shouldn’t have asked, because now he looked at her like she’d just revealed some deep dark secret about herself. There weren’t many friendly faces aboard this vessel, and the moonlight and his kind eyes had obviously played a trick on her tired mind. He and Raven’s relationship didn’t matter to her. The only thing that mattered was surviving- and protecting as many of these kids as possible.

So she slipped back into the mannerisms appropriate of a lady. Straight shoulders, strong chin, dress modestly lifted to walk gracefully.  “Thank you for all of your assistance today Mr. Collins,” she said.

He shook his head, sighed just a bit, and declined his shoulders in a slight bow. “It was my pleasure Princess,” he said. When her back was turned she heard him call out, “I’ll see about getting you some new clothes and a bath.”   
   
She thought he mumbled something about finding her some rose petals or lavender. Despite the slight jab- she couldn’t help but smile.  
 

 

 

She spent the night fighting infection and fever, exhausted and still smelling inhumanly awful. No one died- and that and only that allowed her to sleep for a few hours, sprawled out across a couple of wooden crates. That’s where she was at dawn when the bells rang out.   
   
Captain Blake and the men he seemed to have designated as his officers stood in front of the dead in a somber line.   
   
Clarke loomed as far back in the small crowd as she could manage. She’d seen all she wanted to see of the dead and any actions the Captain took at this point would just seem insincere. She found herself watching him, his clothes hadn’t changed, neither had his demeanor, but for the sake of ceremony he’d left his smirk back in his quarters. That, at least, was decent of him.   
   
Blake turned to face the passengers- his people – and gave them permission to step forward and say a few words about the dead.   
   
No one did.   
   
In the next ten minutes, the bell tolled seventeen times, the ocean’s waves interrupted by the weight of seventeen bodies. Those who cried did so silently, those who prayed simply averted their eyes to the sky. Clarke wrapped her arms around herself and thought about the chill of the wind- a storm that could be gathering just over the horizon, one of many predators lurking on these waters.   
   
It was a new world- and her fate, just like everyone else’s, rested in the hands of Bellamy Blake. 

 

   
Raven stumbled into the hospital sometime after noon. When Clarke had changed bandages and done two rounds with the water. She still wore the sailor’s uniform- but her hair was tied in a higher ponytail. In her arms she clutched a pile of fabric. Clothing that Finn had apparently scavenged up for her. “He said you were making people sick with the smell of you,” she said.   
   
Clarke was grateful- even if the britches were too large and the collar of the white shirt was cut a bit lower than she was used to. She used a fair amount of twine as a belt, and a knife to slice through her shift, using the top portion to cover the skin exposed on her chest. She looked silly, and the clothes smelt like moldy fabric, but her gown was such a reminder of the horrors of the last month that she threw it straight into the fire in the hearth.   
   
Raven followed her around while she tried to get used to walking in heavy pants that were too large. She helped where she could, but seemed to be a bit frustrated. Obviously trying to find her place in the awful situation they’d all found themselves trapped in.   
   
“Finn said you spoke to the Captain,” Raven finally said, most likely to distract herself from the disgusting smell of the bedpans Clarke was emptying overboard. “well- _spoke_ wasn’t exactly the word he used.” 

She smiled, a grin based on her own dislike of Blake. Finn had probably spun some tale about Clarke passionately berating him and making him look like a fool- that’s not exactly how it had happened, but Finn did seem like a romantic.  
   
“We had a productive conversation,” Clarke said.  
   
“You really shouldn’t piss him off,” Raven advised. Clarke should have pointed out the hypocrisy, since Raven had been telling anyone that would listen that Blake was a death plague in human form.  
   
“I didn’t,” she said, because Blake hadn’t really been angry when they’d parted ways. She remembered the look he’d given her, with that glimmer of respect she assumed was residual reverence for her last name.  
   
“You challenged him?” Raven asked.  
   
“Yes.”   
   
Raven snorted. “He’ll have you tossed overboard as soon as these people are back on their feet.”   
   
“I’d consider that a victory,” Clarke said. Raven just raised her eyebrows at her so she continued. “I challenged him to be a good Captain- he’s already proven that he’s an impulsive brute. I’ll admit that I was wrong the moment he starts showing a bit of responsibility-“ 

Raven opened her mouth to argue the moment Clarke had expressed any kind of vague optimism that he could be a good Captain, but before she could start on another rant, a small hand tapped Clarke on the shoulder.  
   
“Clarke?” She stood with a strength Clarke admired. The girl had been running herself ragged in the hospital, one of very few people who had actually devoted a significant amount of time to help, but looking at her you wouldn’t even be able to tell. Her hair was neatly braided, her eyes a clear blue.  
   
“Yes- Hello Octavia,” Clarke said, recalling the girl's name and smiling as politely as she could.  
   
“I wanted to apologize for the way my brother treated you yesterday.” 

Clarke and Raven both widened their eyes. “Your brother?”   
   
“Yes,” she said, “ I spoke to him again this morning, he’s agreed that you won’t need to return to the brig.” 

There she was- the girl that had inspired a mutiny. Now that Clarke knew what to look for, she did see some resemblance. Their skin was tanned to the same tone, their hair the same black, Octavia’s eyes, though the color of the sea rather than the dark brown of tree bark, held the same intensity and a similar shape. Like him, she held herself like she was waiting for a fight. She couldn’t have the military background he did, so it must have come from poverty.  The struggle of day to day survival that – in addition to the devotion of the Captain – would probably guarantee her survival on this floating disaster.

“Well thank you for that,” Clarke said, trying not to let her frustrations with the Captain cloud her judgement of this very helpful girl, “but I had no intentions of returning to the brig.”   
   
Octavia nodded, but reached out for her arm when she started to turn away. “He’s having everyone record their names, so he can start assigning duties,” she said, “he asked if you would take note of the injured, and the severity of their injuries.”   
   
She handed her a ripped piece of parchment and a fancy reed pen that must have come from the captain quarters.   
   
Raven let out a noise that almost sounded like approval. “Seems he’s accepted your challenge.”


	3. Day 2

**Day 2**

The sea had always been the answer for him. 

As an eight-year-old, perched on the mildewed rocks at the harbor looking for a way to explain his father’s absence, a kid of thirteen, who’d quickly grown into the uniform over the summer and had a little sister at home crying through the night from hunger, the enemy of the state- nearly ten years later – who needed to watch that fucking uniform fade away into black nothingness like he’d imagined his mother had.   
   
The sea had given him everything he’d ever needed, dreams, bedtime stories, strong hands, good nerves, a decent living, a way out.   
   
She was the answer. She was always the answer.   
   
“Bellamy?”

 He’d been staring down at his hands – his skin looking almost as worn as the splintered wooden rail. There was a smear of blood across his knuckles – not his own. It wasn’t a shade of red he’d ever seen- wasn’t a shade belonging to anything living. It matched those splotches on the lower deck where all the bodies had laid out.   
   
“Bellamy?!” He turned before that wave of uncertainty started to crest again. His sister stood next to the helm, her hair blowing all around, freed from the braids she’d painstakingly arranged in his office that morning. She’d never seen the sea- really seen it- and he’d never been able to find the words to explain what it felt like to turn your head in every direction and see nothing but shades of blue.   
   
“I’ve finished with the list, got as many as I could,” she said, extending an armful of the parchment he’d found in the captain’s personal affects.   
   
He tried to smile at her, the way they’d smiled at each other yesterday when they’d realized they were both alive, but something felt different now after the funerals.   
   
“Clarke is still working on hers- she’s having trouble identifying the kids that are unconscious.”   
   
He turned and looked back out at the horizon. He hated that she called them kids- but that’s what they were, that’s what all of them were. More than anything he didn’t want to talk about Clarke Griffin and how much of a fucking disruption he knew she would be, like a giant chunk of land embedded into the side of the ship, an obnoxious anchor dressed in torn taffeta keeping him from seeing this as the escape it was, pulling him down into darkness and guilt, punishing him, drowning him.   
   
“Just bring it to me when she’s finished," he said. Octavia stepped around the wheel and tried to meet his eyes.  
   
“What are you going to do to her?” she asked.  
   
The look she gave him was a lot like the one she used to give the alley cats- terrible, vicious things that had lured her in as a small child with their big eyes and furry ears, only to cover her little legs in scratches when she got too close.   
   
“She’s a problem Octavia,” he said with a sigh. She’d bonded with Clarke down in that hospital, and when Octavia bonded with someone- like the baker’s blind wife or the ginger kid that liked to start fires- those bonds were usually too strong for even him to break.  
   
“We’re all problems,” she argued, “that’s why we’re here.”   
   
She was blind to the true nature of people- the division, the competition, she always had been. “She’s not one of us,” he reminded her.  
   
“Maybe she is,” she said, “she laid in the same filth I did for the first half of this journey.”   
   
He ignored that- ignored it because the image of his little sister in chains laying in the deepest darkest bowels of this ship made something boil in his gut, but it was more than that- because the truth was that Clarke Griffin just might have just been the most dangerous thing on that ship. Fuck the canons, and the infection, and Murphy shooting seagulls from the crow’s nest, he understood those threats, he could manage them, but Griffin was another story entirely. She spent her whole life sipping tea with her family in the velvet lining of the king’s pocket. She never knew starvation, never lived in the filth of the village. She was raised not to question those that resided at the top- and yet her father was the first man of power Bellamy had ever known to actually stand up for what was right. He was a good man- and she was clearly angry about what had happened to him, as she should be, but when that anger finally settled- if she let go of him, let herself imagine that he was simply off on another voyage- she could decide that she didn’t want to play a complacent role in all of this. She could decide to turn people against him. She had the motivation, it may very well have been the blood of her dead friend smeared across his knuckles. She was clearly very intelligent, some of her father’s leadership skills must have been genetic - she’d had that hospital organized in mere hours- to a certain extent she was an asset, or could be. If he could trust her. If he was willing to trust her.   
   
   
That was a matter for another time. Now that they’d disposed of the dead, it was time to rid themselves of the last reminder that this ship had once sailed under the King’s colors: the cluster of sailors in the brig, who had been too foolish to see that they were pawns in a ruthless King’s war for more power. Men he had known through training, men he had once considered brothers. They’d called him traitor when he’d lead the attack, those few who hadn’t rallied behind him. As his men disarmed them and drug their bodies to the brig Bellamy had heard his name damned in at least three different languages. Maybe he’d end up in hell for everything he did. That seemed like another issue he could worry about later, now he had to decide whether his soul could bear the weight of putting twelve more men to death. 

That’s what a pirate would do, and he was a pirate now. A good pirate Captain, like the ones he’d read stories about as a child, would string their bodies up somewhere the King’s navy would find them, but going back into his territory would only expand the target on their backs. They needed to get as far away as possible, to disappear in the western lands. They couldn’t do that with a brig full of the enemy.   
   
“Everyone needs to be out on deck at sunset,” he told Octavia, “we need to deal with our prisoners.”   
   
“Are you going to kill them?”   
   
He didn’t answer her. 

Instead he spent the day in quiet contemplation. He had to protect them- his sister and himself first and foremost. Every one of those men had seen his face. If they made it back to the Kingdom and told Marcus Kane exactly who it was that started the mutiny, he and Octavia would never be able to step foot on land again. Even in pirate territory, the reward alone would motivate them to break ranks and ship them right back into the hands of the King. There was no loyalty there- by definition- and he wasn’t even a pirate really. He was a desperate man who had gotten what he wanted because failing his sister was unfathomable.

He’d known, as he crouched down in the hold and whispered orders to an equally desperate Lieutenant Kyle Wick, that taking control of the ship was part of it. Wick didn’t want it, he just wanted the weight of what they were doing off of their shoulders. He’d been promoted because his father had died in service. He had a way with carpentry, one that was considered bellow his station. He’d probably never wanted to be a sailor, and Bellamy had turned him into a pirate. Bellamy had turned all of them into pirates. Of course some were taking to it more than others. There was a faction of the loud and boisterous- with a few young men who had probably only avoided execution because of their age. Murphy had taken to them, firing off unnecessary shots and screaming into the night over card games. They’d want the sailors’ hung- or shot- or whatever execution style would give them the most blood.

 The sailors who had joined their cause- Wick, Miller, and a kid named Sterling among a few others, mostly stuck to their duties- but they’d been passionate enough about the King’s corruption to throw their comrades into the brig. Bellamy wasn’t sure how they’d want the situation handled.

The majority of them, the young, the sick, the ones that hung around Clarke Griffin like a bad smell, they’d probably fight for mercy. It’s easy to kill in the moment, battle gives you adrenaline that seems to overpower even the loudest of consciences, but this- what will probably amount to a military tribunal- this would involve a lot of drawn out thinking and planning. 

The only thing he was sure of was that there would be chaos. Unless he took it out of their hands.

By the time the sun starts to set, most of the passengers have gathered into small clusters on deck. Bellamy had sent a few men down to the brig to gather the prisoners. He stood with his arms behind his back- his own pistol tucked carefully in his waistband, the Captain’s ridiculously ornamental sword in its sheath.  Most people nodded to him as they pass, but they kept their distance. He preferred it that way- it was best if they feared him, for his sister’s sake if anything. A girl alone on a ship full of half-starved drunken men who were barely an age to call themselves men was doomed- they needed to know that horrible, unimaginable things would happen to them if they laid a hand on her.

“Starting another riot?”

His head snapped up as she passed. A woman with a dark complexion, her hair tied back in a sailor’s ribbon. The stowaway. Kyle Wick had advocated for her life- recognizing her as someone’s daughter, so they’d tossed her down there with the other someone’s daughter and to the best of his knowledge that was where she remained.

“Who let you out?” he demanded.

“I’m not an animal.”

“You’re a prisoner.”

“So was everyone else on this vessel.”

He remembered Octavia making the same argument, they were all equal, they were all in the same boat (as it were). It was a dangerous concept. One that needed to be squashed before it grew into something uncontrollable.

“Everyone on this vessel is alive because I permit it,” he told her with a glare, “don’t forget that.”

“So you’re going to kill them?” she asked, “ because I’ve got to warn you, if you’re hoping to actually keep that Captain’s sword murdering men who were only doing their jobs isn’t the best idea. They already think you’re a monster.”

It’s what he wanted, but hearing her actually say it made his stomach clench. “You’ve been talking to Clarke Griffin.”

The woman smiled, “Oh I wish we could put that to a vote. You’d be surprised how many would rather see her at the helm.”

He scoffed, “She’s not a sailor.”

“She’s a fucking hero. That’s all these kids care about. She saves lives- you end them. You’re the Grim Reaper Blake, and she’s a goddamn Guardian Angle. Which would you rather follow?”

He took a step closer to her. “If you’re insinuating that Clarke Griffin is going to be a problem-“ he raised his sword slightly.

She didn’t back down. “Try,” she said, “I know people that would die for her. Can you say the same?”

He could end her- quickly, quietly, but doing so would mean facing that act the way he never has before. Now isn’t the time for it, not when he’s already juggling the lives of 12 men. “I promise you that if you don’t step away right now I’ll destroy you and Griffin before that moon rises.”

She smirked but took a step back. “Looking forward to it.”

As she walked away, his hand twitched towards his pistol twice. She didn’t even belong there, he hadn’t saved her, she’d chosen to be there. She and Griffin would be catalysts to anarchy.

“Ready?” Kyle Wick asked, his nerves causing his voice to shake.

“What’s her name?” Bellamy asked- with a nod to her retreating back.

“Raven Reyes.” Wick answered. Bellamy could hear the concern there- but he didn’t have time to worry about misplaced infatuation.

“Put her on the list,” he said.

“What list?”

“Whatever list Griffin is on.”

He walked away when he heard the sound of chains. Twelve dusty, half-starved sailors trooped out onto the deck. Bellamy knew half of their names, but he pushed them to the back of his mind. He had told them the true destination of The Phoenix. He’d given them the opportunity to renounce their loyalty to the King. They had all chosen not to believe him- or not to care. He had to look at them as the enemy, even as they trembled and squinted pathetically in the dimming sunlight.

When the men had been settled on the deck- Murphy and Atom’s rifles pointed at the back of their heads, Bellamy stepped in front of them.

“You all grew up in a land that didn’t give you a say in anything.” He began, “You were prisoners before you were arrested, before you stepped foot on this ship. A man looked down at you from his window and decided how you would live. He could see it even from there- the filth, the hunger, the bodies being removed by the dozens because of preventable illnesses. He saw all of this and he did nothing. His answer is to barter with a corrupt kingdom, known for exploiting human lives. He bartered with you. He sacrificed you for gold- gold that won’t benefit your families or your homes. Gold that will be spent on wars to conquer more land, create more poverty, and send men like me- like Miller- like Wick- like these men, to die for a King that has never seen a battlefield himself. When we took this ship, I told these men about the Mountain. I warned them of the King’s corruption. They chose to remain loyal to him.”

The crowd started to get loud, someone even chucked an apple core at one of the sailors.

“On this ship, they represent the land that hated you, that chained you up and cast you off. They are the last link we have to what could have been, the last survivors of those people who looked down on you from their windows.”

“Except for her. “Murphy said- he raised his gun and Bellamy followed its trajectory to Clarke Griffin. She wasn’t even looking at the gun, her eyes stayed steadily trained on him, Finn Collins and Raven Reyes at her side. He caught his sister’s eyes, standing just a few feet from them, and turned away.

“Put it down Murphy.” Bellamy said- despite the fact that some of the men were goading him on.

Murphy laughed, “She’s one of them-“

“DID I ASK FOR YOUR OPINION?!” Bellamy boomed, “Are you under the impression that what you think matters? Because I promise you Murphy, it doesn’t! We are here to deal with the Sailors of The Phoenix. I’m choosing to give you a say in their lives, but you don’t raise that gun against anyone else on this ship without my permission is that fucking understood?!”

Murphy lowered the gun but he didn’t shut up, “There shouldn’t be a fucking discussion. They need to die. Anyone not loyal to our cause needs to die.”

People cheered.

“It’s what they would have done to us!” Murphy continued, “they should be strung up and gutted the way the Mountain would have done us!”

The cheers grew louder.

“They killed our people,” a girl chimed in, “it’s only fair.”

“If they stay on this ship they could kill more!” someone else yelled.

Suddenly there were choruses of cheering, and phrases like “hang them” and “walk the plank!”

Bellamy was about to wave his hand to silence them, when Clarke Griffin pushed her way through the crowd to stand right in front of him, right back in the pathway of Murphy’s rifle.

“There are other options,” she said.

Half of the crowd disagreed with her- but others who had remained silent started making some noise.

“We can’t have them on the ship,” Bellamy said- surprisingly he met her eyes, like he felt like she needed to hear it more than everyone else.

“There are other options,” she repeated- her voice lowered, “we have the ship’s boat-“

“Set it out to sea,” Murphy suggested.

“Let ‘em sit out there and rot,” a larger boy said with a snarl.

That actually wasn’t a bad idea. He’d just leave them to the mercy of nature. Get them off the ship, but not actually spill blood on it’s deck.

“Bellamy,” he was startled to hear her say his first name, but realized she’d said it so quietly among the rowdy shouts of the others, that no one else had heard. “Don’t do this, not like that,” she said, “it’s unnecessary.”

He looked away from her and motioned to his men. “Put them in the boat-“

The kids all cheered, some even joining in to grab a hold of the struggling, chained, blindfolded, and gagged sailors. The man that was once Captain didn’t fight at all. Bellamy made a mental note to spare him a thought at some point for his bravery.

“You’re condemning them to death,” Griffin said.

“I’m not killing them,” he reminded her as he supervised the clump of crowd and prisoners that struggled around the ship’s boat.

“Give them water, rations, a weapon!” she said, “It could be days before someone finds them. They’re sailors Bellamy- they did what they thought was right just like you did!”

He squeezed his eyes together and tried to fight the urge to shove her away, “We don’t have rations to spare-“

“You need to learn that being a leader doesn’t mean being merciless,” she snapped.

He froze. That guilt that had been dragging behind him like an anchor finally using its weight to drop right into his gut. Mercy was a beautiful thing, but he’d never seen it, neither had most of these people. Deep down he knew that those sailors didn’t deserve it- but he also knew that the point of this was to save his sister from living in a world without mercy. He couldn’t be them. He couldn’t be as cold as they were. Octavia would never look at him the same.

He couldn’t be weak though, not even in front of Clarke Griffin.

“Get in my face again- and you’ll join them,” he sneered at her.

Her shoulders slumped. Finn Collins had come up behind her- as if he would protect her from Bellamy or the mob gathering around her. She didn’t even seem to notice him as she turned towards the people crowding the boat.

“If those men die, every one of you becomes a murderer!” she yelled, “You can still be good, you can still have a life. “If you don’t know what it feels like to take a life- I promise you don’t want to,” she turned back to Bellamy, “don’t put this on them,” she urged.

He thought again of his sister, who looked out at the crowd like she was confused, like maybe she hadn’t actually picked a side. Of course he didn’t want to put the lives of these men on her, he didn’t want them on himself. It was down to logic now. They needed to conserve rations. They needed to make a clean break. If they were permitted to stay on board, someone in this crowd would inevitably kill them, then Bellamy would have to discipline that person for insubordination and it would circle round and round. All for men who hadn’t been able to stand up for the right when the time came. This was the grey area answer. Give them the chance to live. Give the people the satisfaction of believing they probably died. Be a pirate- cruel or merciful, however you chose to look at it.

“Leave it to the sea,” he said.

The crowd erupted again, the mob grew. Clarke Griffin shrunk back and shook her head. It reminded him of the paintings on the side of the church in his village. An angel that hung her head over sinners, same blonde hair, same bright skin. A few people watched her look defeated, and they themselves seemed to shrink in the shadow of a perceived Grim Reaper. 

He stared up at the sky above him- cloudier than it was that morning- cloudy and grey in the setting sun. Middle ground, twilight, a perfect combination of night and day. It was so fucking poetic it made him sick, but he understood then, understood why Octavia had argued for her. Understood why Reyes was had ranted about. That balance that he’d been trying to find- between being feared and being merciful.  She was it.

 “Fuck,” he said under his breath, he looked around and grabbed the nearest trustworthy person he could find. “Wick,” he said, knowing controversial heroism was becoming the man’s second nature. “Put enough rations in there for two days, Scraps, molded stuff, anything that could keep them alive long enough for someone to pick them up,” he said.

“You sure about this?”

Bellamy just raised his eyebrows and Wick nodded.

 “They’ll tell them about us.” Murphy said, coming up to him with his rifle shouldered. Thankfully having not heard Bellamy’s previous order.

“They won’t have anything to tell,” Bellamy said gruffly, “the King won’t chase us into pirate territory. It’s not worth it. They know me- but my name’s already been disgraced. They can talk all they want, won’t make a difference.”

He was trying to convince himself as well. Maybe Murphy picked up on that, because he cocked his gun dramatically.

“Dead men can’t talk at all.”

Suddenly Clarke Griffin was at his other side again, her fists clenched. “Bellamy, don’t let this idiot talk you into-“

“No one is talking me into anything Princess,” he told her. It was a lie- she’d talked him into a lot more than she realized. He expected her to fight back, but her eyes landed instead on Kyle Wick who was discreetly tossing the bag of rations into the boat. Most of the other’s didn’t notice. Griffin did.

She turned and met his eyes, more shocked than he’d ever seen her. He feared she might make a scene, but instead she just took a deep breath and turned towards the creaking noises coming from the boat as it was lowered into the sea.

The kids cursed the sailors, some of whom cursed back. Miller tossed the oars to them- only one actually made it into the boat. Before they drifted too far Bellamy lifted himself up onto the railing and grabbed some rigging for balance. The crowd quieted. He glanced back to make sure they were all looking, but was careful not to look at any one face in particular.  
Instead he took the Captain’s sword from it’s sheath, the one that the King had presented to the Phoenix’s Captain on the day of his appointment, the one that had commanded a slave ship and tossed it within arm’s reach of at least two bound men on the boat.

 “Use it to free yourselves," he said- the clanking of the metal enough of an indicator for the men to know what he was talking about. “You can start when you hear cannon fire. We’ll be watching. A minute sooner and it’ll be you we fire at.”

He stepped down from the rail and gave orders to Miller to raise anchor. Some of the crowd dispersed to fulfill the duties they had just learned.  “If you do make it back to the King,” Bellamy yelled out to the boat when there was some distance between them, “you make sure he knows that we’ve escaped to the Western lands. Any attempt to find us will only result in being commandeered again, this time by real pirates.”

He looked up at the dark sky- watched it as they sailed away from the boat, watched it even as the cannon fired, even as the kids started celebrating. There was something eerie about the film of grey clouds hiding the stars.

“Heading Captain?” Miller finally asked.

As Bellamy turned to look at him he saw Griffin on the lower deck, glancing up at the helm. She met his eyes and nodded once, then turned her head towards the sea.

“North West,” Bellamy said. He recalled the maps- the little that was actually filled in. “We sail until we see land.”

Miller nodded, but Bellamy could see apprehension. “What is it?” he asked.

“Pirates sir? We’ll be sailing through their waters-“

“We fly a black flag”

“They’ll recognize this as a naval vessel," he insisted.

Bellamy nodded. “I’ll find another route.”

They'd survived- and that had seemed difficult enough.

Now came the hard part, now came the living..


End file.
